


Don't You Fret, My Dear

by benedictedcumberbatched



Category: Sherlock (TV)
Genre: Blood Loss, Character Death, F/M, Grief/Mourning, IOU, Murder
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-01-02
Updated: 2015-01-02
Packaged: 2018-03-04 20:51:26
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,287
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3089003
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/benedictedcumberbatched/pseuds/benedictedcumberbatched
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The building held many memories, but none stood out more than that night, a month after the message of Moriarty’s face had been broadcast across the country. As he pushed open the door to the morgue a few days later, his eyes staring at but not seeing the long since familiar white sheet on the slab.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Don't You Fret, My Dear

**Author's Note:**

> Sherlock and Molly don't belong to me, as always.
> 
> Title from "Kingdom Come" by The Civil Wars

\--

Story inspired by [belleillumina](http://belleillumina.tumblr.com/)'s [image](https://33.media.tumblr.com/7bcc09b06034ffef8d986e38f7846d3c/tumblr_n0mferm92a1sy33j2o9_1280.jpg) in her [I.O.U.](http://belleillumina.tumblr.com/post/75886895332/i-o-u-sherlolly-comic-the-panels-with) comic.

\--

The pathology building at St. Bartholomew’s Hospital had seen its fair share of adventure once Sherlock Holmes made it his scientific operations center. Most of the staff couldn’t tolerate the eccentric man and only further irritated him, but there were a select few who he added to his small network of useful people. Mike Stamford had been his access into the lab and morgue to do his work or take part in solving his crimes. He could vaguely remember the first day he had walked into the morgue without permission, startling the young woman whose hands had been buried deep in the abdominal cavity of the latest deceased. He had been high as a kite, deducing her and the body, mostly the body and the circumstances of its untimely demise, before Detective Inspector Lestrade had intervened and dragged him out of the morgue, apologizing to the woman named Molly.

His brother had once called it his home from home, although the context was less favorable. The fact remained that the pathology building had indeed been his home from home. It was where he could get away with all his antics when he wanted to, where he solved many a crime. When he wasn’t at Baker Street or running through the streets of London, he could usually be found at his microscope in the lab.

The building held many memories, but none stood out more than that night, a month after the message of Moriarty’s face had been broadcast across the country. As he pushed open the door to the morgue a few days later, his eyes staring at but not seeing the long since familiar white sheet on the slab.

\--

He had never had a more difficult case. The danger surrounding him and his friends was a constant and the tension in his shoulders had not lessened since the plane had turned around and returned to the tarmac after four minutes in the air.

Eyes glued to his mobile as he entered St. Barts, he didn’t notice that the lights were off. It wasn’t until he was right outside the morgue that he paused and looked around. It was completely dark, the only light coming from the emergency exit signs.

“Molly?” he called aloud, tucking his mobile into his pocket. Slowly, he pushed open the door to the morgue. It was dark inside the morgue as well. Slowly but surely, his eyes adjusted and he could make out the autopsy tables. Taking a few steps into the darkened morgue he looked around cautiously, wondering where his pathologist was. Something crunched underfoot and he paused, fumbling in his pocket to pull out his small torch. Clicking the end, he shone the beam of light at his feet and felt his stomach drop when he saw all the broken glass.

“Molly?” he called again, stepping in further, casting the light over the rest of the room. An autopsy table was shifted to the side, as if shoved hard toward something to slow it down. Bowls, scales, and various tools lay scattered around, thrown haphazardly around the room. His heart pounded in his chest as he saw the trail of blood leading to the far corner of the morgue near Molly’s office door.

His breathing grew shallow through his nose as he creeped slowly toward that corner, following along side the trail. There was too much blood even he knew that. Two and a half liters of blood loss left a person unconscious. With a heart rate of 140 beats per minute, breathing would be shallow, blood pressure incredibly low. There was no way someone could possibly survive a loss of two and a half liters of blood or more. He didn’t know how much blood was on the floor now but it was too much.

His chest tightened as the light from his torch fell upon a larger pool of blood. A usually dark brown shoe was stained practically black. A hand, white and pale extended toward the door as if in a last ditch effort to reach for the handle, but fell short when it found it could not go on any further. He panned his light further along, dreading what was surely coming and a strangled cry came out as the light illuminated the body, the starched white still visible in places of her lab coat. Her hair fell over her face, shielding her from view.

He staggered over to her before he fell to his knees, the torch falling out of his hand and rolling out of sight. He reached out and brushed her hair off her face, tucking it behind her ear. “M-Molly?” he murmured quietly, brushing his fingers along her cheek, trying to wake her. “Molly, wake up, come on, look at me,” he pleaded, his voice rising as she continued to be unresponsive. His hand grappled for her neck, pressing against her pulse point, praying to deities he didn’t believe in that he would feel that steady thrum of life beneath her skin.

But there was nothing. He released a shaky breath as his hand cupped her cheek for a moment before moving it beneath her nose, hoping for the light breeze of air on his skin but again, nothing. “Molly!” he yelled, his hands curling into fists as he slid to sit on the floor, before he threw all protocol to the winds and pulled her to his chest. He cradled her, rocking back and forth slowly, while he tried to control the onslaught of emotions he usually kept locked up tight from pouring forth and flooding his senses.

He didn’t know how long he sat there, his head bowed over her as he held her. This was the closest he had ever been to her. All those kisses on the cheeks, the glances across the lab or autopsy tables when working on cases. It was too late to acknowledge things now. He could remember standing in that hallway at Shilcott’s flat, the words he had wanted to say to her over chips falling short, as he had noticed her engagement ring. All those moments over the past year flickering past in his mind’s eye as if a film on fast-forward, now just memories he could relive alone. Exhaling shakily, he pressed a kiss to her forehead; his eyes squeezed shut, before gently lowering her back to the floor.

Moving, he sat back against the door, her head in his lap, his hand smoothing over her hair as if she were just sleeping. He scanned along her body, counting the tears in her clothing, the strategically placed wounds that led to all of this. He took his free hand and pulled out his mobile, silently pulling up the contact. He hesitated after pressing the dial button and raising the device to his ear.

“John…it’s-it’s Molly. Please come to Barts.” Sherlock hung up right after that, setting his mobile in his pocket against before looking down at her.

“I’m so sorry, Molly Hooper,” he whispered as he continued to smooth her hair.

\--

John walked through the door and stopped short as he automatically reached for the light switch and turned it on. Sherlock winced at the sudden burst of light, his hands tightening around her. “Oh Christ…” came John’s voice from the doorway as he stepped toward them. John couldn’t decide where to look, at Sherlock cradling Molly on the floor, both covered in blood, or at the I-O-U scrawled on the wall with blood, a smiley face in the center of the ‘O’.

However, if John had noticed the tear tracks on Sherlock’s face, he never mentioned them afterward.


End file.
